Toccata (in D Minor)
by ohalaskayoung
Summary: Lexa needs an accompanist for her senior showcase, and it looks like Clarke is the only one for the job.


**Prologue**

A tan woman with a hard, wide face and a wild mane of dark hair storms into the practice room. Clarke jumps, her hands tripping over the keys. A warped chord rings through the air, but the woman seems nonplussed.

"Are you a senior?" she barks as Clarke stands up from the bench.

"No, I'm a junior," Clarke says hesitantly. "Why? Who are y-"

"My name is Anya. My student needs an accompanist for her senior showcase in three weeks. You're it."

"What?" Clarke sputters. "No, I can't-"

"You're a junior, which means A: You're not preparing for a showcase, so you aren't busy, and B: You need the experience. And I don't give compliments often, so listen closely: I haven't heard anyone else play as well as you do in a long time."

"I-I-" Clarke tries to come up with an excuse, but as she stares at Anya, her face set in a deep frown, they die on her lips. "Alright."

"Good. You two will meet on Stage B tomorrow at ten. Don't be late."

Anya turns on her heel and stalks out the door. Stunned, Clarke sinks back onto the bench.

 _What did she just agree to?_

 **21 Days**

Clarke arrives on Stage B at approximately nine fifty-eight and is greeted by a frowning Anya and a tense looking young woman with her hair pulled away from her face and woven into a tight braid down her back.

"You're Clarke?" the young woman asks, striding forward to meet her and stopping short only a few inches in front of her.

Clarke gulps. "Yes. I-"

"Play for me what you played for Anya yesterday." The young woman gestures to the grand piano in the center of the stage. Clarke wipes her palms on the back of her jeans, deciding not to comment on the fact that she didn't _play_ for Anya, Anya _eavesdropped_ on her playing, feeling that this girl would not be too enthralled by the technicalities of it.

"You'll do." The girl's sharp tone makes Clarke's fingers still over the keys. She strides forward and thrusts a bunch of sheet music at Clarke and then hands her a thick, worn score. "We'll rehearse here every day at nine o'clock sharp. Do not arrive later than that."

"Alright." Clarke stands from the bench and the woman turns to leave. "Wait!"

She stops halfway across the stage and turns sharply. "What is it?"

"What's your name?" Clarke asks, feeling slightly silly, as if she should have asked before.

The woman's shoulders relax slightly, just for a second. "Lexa," she says, a bit softer this time.

Clarke smiles, and Lexa gives her a curt nod before walking away.

 **20 Days**

Their first rehearsal is rough. Lexa tries her best to remain calm, but Clarke just doesn't know the music yet. Her tempo is about half of what it has to be, and Lexa keeps trying to push it, but Clarke just isn't ready.

It ends with Lexa snapping at her that she needs to learn the music quicker and Clarke storming out as soon as they're finished, angry and flustered and unable to stop thinking about the way one stray curl just barely brushed Lexa's forehead the entire rehearsal.

 **19 Days**

Clarke shows up to their next rehearsal with bags under her eyes and greasy hair. She barely speaks to Lexa, instead she flies through their piece with a practiced grace. Her triplets still need work, and there are a few measures where she trips over the notes, but Lexa cannot deny that she has improved tenfold.

She adjourns early, and when Clarke is leaving, she gives her a small smile.

"Nice job today," Lexa says.

Clarke smiles back.

 **18 Days**

Anya shows up for their third rehearsal. While Lexa is doing her warm-up scales, Clarke tries to make small talk with the fierce woman.

"I've been Lexa's teacher since she was eight years old, " Anya tells her. "We practiced every day after school and for four hours on Saturdays. Her parents died in a car accident when she was sixteen, and I've been her guardian ever since."

"Are you ready to begin, Clarke?" Lexa asks, interrupting their conversation. Clarke hurries to the piano.

"Do you want to start at the beginning?"

"Start at the beginning, but skip the repeats," Anya commands. "Then work on problem spots."

They do as she says, and after playing the same three measures nearly fifty times, Lexa finally nails the slur. Anya tells her that she sounds lovely, and Clarke is shocked to see Lexa's practically blinding smile.

Later that night, she is even more surprised to find herself still thinking about it. Wanting to see it again.

 **17 Days**

The lineup for the senior showcase is released, and Lexa is listed last. She crumples up the paper and chucks it across the stage in disgust.

"Hey," Clarke murmurs, standing behind her and placing a tentative hand on her shoulder. Lexa tenses but doesn't shake it off. "They save the best for last, you know."

She doesn't say anything, but later Clarke finds her retrieving the paper and smoothing it out over her knee.

 **16 Days**

They don't have rehearsal, but Clarke suspects that she left behind her Western Civ homework, she she slips in the back entrance of the stage and snoops around where she normally leaves her things. Lexa is there, only she isn't playing their piece. She's playing something faster, something with more life.

She is playing with her eyes closed, with no music in front of her. When the piece slows down, she begins to sway with the music.

Clarke has never seen someone so beautiful.

 **15 Days**

"You need to be better, Clarke!"

"I'm trying my best, Lexa!"

"Your best isn't good enough!"

Clarke stands up, her bench squeaking as it's pushed behind her. "You're not going to be happy until you push me away, are you?"

Lexa slams her bow down on her stand.

"I'm doing this as a favor to _you_. Do you understand that?" Clarke stalks towards her, and Lexa stands. "I am doing this to help _you_."

"Well you aren't helping me by messing up on every other note!"

"Get a new accompanist, then! Find someone who doesn't care that you're an asshole." Clarke grabs her music and storms out, shoving ast Lexa as she goes.

 **14 Days**

Despite what she yelled the day before, Clarke still shows up for their next rehearsal. Lexa is sheepish as she tells her about Gustus, her first accompanist.

"When I wasn't rehearsing with him, I was with my girlfriend, Costia," Lexa explains. "He thought she was holding me back. He convinced me that she was a distraction, and I believed him. We broke up and had a huge fight, and on her way home from my place some guy tried to mug her. She put up a fight, and so he shot her."

"And you blame yourself," Clarke says "don't you?"

"I do." Lexa bows her head. "I basically told Gustus to fuck off after that, and I stopped playing for six months. Anya kicked me out of my funk a few weeks ago and told me that Costia would have wanted me to get my shit together."

Clarke is silent.

"I don't mean to be an asshole," Lexa says. "I just wanted you to understand why I have been."

Clarke grabs Lexa's hand and gives it a squeeze. They rehearse without incident for the rest of the day.

 **13 Days**

Unlucky thirteen. Clarke receives a phone call from her estranged mother that throws off the whole practice. Abby Griffin is as cold as usual, condemning her daughter's choice to major in music instead of continuing as premed. Her mind is unfocused as they play, and Clarke can tell Lexa is biting her tongue, trying not to make a comment.

"I'll be better tomorrow, I promise," Clarke says as she's leaving. She waits until she gets home to cry.

 **12 Days**

"You don't need to be better, Clarke," Lexa tells her at their next rehearsal. Clarke stops playing and looks at her in shock.

"What?"

"Yesterday," Lexa says, looking down, "you said you'd be better. You don't need to be. I think you are very, very talented, Clarke."

 **11 Days**

They get coffee together after rehearsal. Lexa orders an espresso and Clarke orders some kind of frappucino that has so much chocolate and caramel in it that Lexa scoffs.

"That's hardly even coffee," she says, rolling her eyes.

Clarke nudges her shoulder. "What about you? That's not coffee, that's straight adrenaline."

Lexa rolls her eyes again, but with a smile this time.

Clarke fishes a pen out of her bag and sketches Lexa's likeness on a napkin. As she draws, she tells her that she's always been interested in art, but pursued music as a way to stay close to her father,who had first taught her piano. When she's done with the sketch, Lexa takes it and folds it up tenderly before placing behind the front cover of her score.

 **10 Days**

With ten days to go, Anya cracks down on Lexa. She makes them run the piece over and over again, until their arms are both shaking. Afterwards, Lexa's end pin is stuck and won't slide back into place. She yanks at it angrily until Clarke comes over and kneels beside her. Their hands touch as she helps her maneuver it back into place, and Clarke tries to ignore the spark she feels in the pit of her stomach.

 **9 Days**

Lexa can barely stay upright as she plays. Her face is pale and she's trembling, but when Clarke presses a hand to her forehead, she is burning up and sticky with sweat.

"Come on," Clarke cajoles her, putting away her cello and packing up her music for her. "You're going home."

Lexa mumbled the directions to her apartment off campus, and Clarke fishes her key out of her bag. She helps her inside and makes her drink and entire glass of water and take some acetaminophen before tucking her into bed.

"Thank you, Clarke," Lexa croaks out, grasping her wrist. Without thinking, Clarke bends down and presses a kiss to Lexa's forehead.

"Rest up, Lexa," she says tenderly before slipping out the door.

 **8 Days**

Clarke texts Lexa that morning to tell her to stay in bed and that she will be over in twenty minutes. When she arrives, she is toting an espresso, a can of chicken noodle soup, and two king-sized Kit Kats. After setting up Lexa's laptop at the foot of her bed, Clarke snuggles in beside her and absentmindedly braids strands of her hair while the first season of _Parks and Recreation_ plays at their feet.

Lexa dozes off around noon and when she wakes up two hours later to find Clarke as the big spoon, snoring lightly against her back, she can't help the smile that spreads across her face.

 **7 Days**

They return to rehearsal the next day. It's not awkward, but something has definitely changed between them. Clarke catches Lexa staring at her when she should be looking at her music. Lexa winks at her when she plays a problematic measure with ease. When they pack up for the day, Clarke waits for Lexa to put her cello away and they leave together.

 **6 Days**

Perhaps it's knowing that there is less than a week until the showcase, or the fact that Clarke woke up with a pounding headache that turned her mood sour, or that Lexa spilled espresso on her music that morning and can't find her spare copy, but they have their worst rehearsal yet. Every note is bad, Lexa's A string keeps slipping out of tune, and within half an hour they are screaming at each other over things they can't control.

"Get out of here, Clarke," Lexa snaps, scrambling to grab her things. "I can do this without you."

 _No, you can't_ , she thinks, but what she says is, "Fuck you. "

When she stomps out, she doesn't look back.

 **5 Days**

Nothing.

 **4 Days**

Lexa texts Clarke at four a.m. and asks her to come back. She debates blocking her number and forgetting the whole thing, but she drags herself out of bed anyway and makes her way down to the stage.

"I'm sorry, Clarke," Lexa says lowly when she appears. "I was wrong. I can't do this without you."

Clarke steps forward and takes Lexa's hands in hers. They're trembling.

"I know," she says softly.

 **3 Days**

They sound better than ever. Anya watches with a smile on her face and doesn't have a single criticism.

 **2 Days**

Clarke is late to rehearsal. When she arrives, she sees Lexa talking with a tall, burly man. He is gesturing animatedly, and Lexa looks stricken.

"What's going on?" she asks, striding across the stage to them. Lexa looks to Clarke with wide eyes.

"Clarke, this i-"

"I am Gustus, Lexa's accompanist," the man says, cutting her off. Lexa's eyes narrow.

" _Former_ accompanist," she says sharply. Gustus pays her no mind.

"I am here to tell Lexa that one of my friends is a cellist in the New York Philharmonic. If I were to accompany Lexa during her senior showcase, he would be in the audience, and he could guarantee Lexa an audition next fall."

Clarke's stomach sinks.

"Clarke," Lexa says softly, "it's my only shot."

"Well," Clarke chokes out, "it looks like you can do this without me after all."

 **1 Day**

Clarke throws away her all of her music. Tear sting her eyes as she rips each sheet to shreds. She tells herself that she doesn't know why she's crying, that the showcase had nothing to do with her anyway, but she's knows she's just lying to herself.

That night she dreams of Lexa, of that day she overheard her playing a different piece, and when she wakes up her eyes are still wet with tears.

 **Showcase**

Lexa is in a panic in the rehearsal room backstage. Gustus is messing up, worse than Clarke did on her first day. A part of her wants to reach out, to give Clarke a call and beg and plead for her to come back. The other part of her, the proud part, the part that feels sick when she thinks of the way Clarke looked as she walked out of her life, keeps her silent.

A knock on the door jolts them out of their practice. Lexa turns to see Clarke standing in the doorway.

"I came to wish you good luck," she says, her voice thick. "You'll do amazing."

"I-" Lexa looks back at Gustus, who is studying the music as if it's in a different language. "Gustus."

His head snaps up. "What?"

"Get the hell out of here."

Clarke's eyes widen.

"Excuse me?" Gustus sputters. "Do you want that audition or not?"

"I can get a damn audition on my own," Lexa scoffs. "Now get the fuck out."

He slams his hands down on the keys and stomps away from the piano. Clarke watches him go, mildly amused. Lexa turns to her and looks up at her sheepishly from beneath her eyelashes.

"You have every right to punch me in the face right now," Lexa says, "but I really need you right now. You're the only one I want to work with."

Clarke strides forward and cups Lexa's face in her hands. "Stop talking, you asshole," she says, seconds before she presses her lips to hers.

 **Epilogue**

 **Five Years Later**

She has a perfect view of the stage from her seat in the audience. Just as the performance starts, a man takes a seat next to her.

"Good evening," he says, extending a hand to her. "Bellamy Blake."

"Clarke Griffin," she says politely, shaking it. "Are you here for anyone in particular?"

"See the brunette sitting second stand in Violin I?" he says, pointing at the stage. Clarke squints until she sees the slender young woman with the striking jawline. "That's my sister. What about you?"

"You see the principal cello?" Clarke whispers, motioning to Lexa, who looks stunning as she commands the cello section. A fond smile graces her face as she speaks. "That's my wife."


End file.
